The European Film Awards are presented in 15 categories and take place in Berlin every second year.

Every year, the various activities of the European Film Academy culminate in the ceremony of the European Film Awards which are presented jointly with EFA Productions GmbH. In a total of 18 categories, among them European Film, European Director, European Actress and European Actor, the European Film Awards annually honour the greatest achievements in European cinema.

The awards ceremony takes place in Berlin every second year. In the other years, the Awards travel: London, Paris, Rome, Barcelona, Warsaw, Copenhagen, Tallinn and Malta.

For the first time, the nominations were chosen in a two-step procedure: An international committee consisting of EFA Board Member Vanessa Henneman (Netherlands) and experts Fabia Bettini (Alice nella Città/Italy), Keld Mathiesen (UCN - University College of Northern Denmark), Rajko Petrović (Five Stars Film Distribution/Serbia) and Lina Užkuraitytė (International Vilnius Film Festival for Children and Youth/Lithuania) pre-selected six films. A jury of 13-to-14-year-old former YAA participants Jesse (London/UK), Konstantin (Chemnitz/Germany), Maria (Lisbon/Portugal), Friederike (Luxembourg) and Milica (Podgorica/Montenegro) then watched these six films and chose the three nominations.

On 5 May, the three nominated films will be screened simultaneously to audiences of 12-14-year-olds in the following 34 countries across Europe and beyond:

In all of these cities, the EFA Young Audience Award offers the young participants the opportunity to discover high-quality European films in cinema theatres. Under the guidance of experienced film teachers, they get to discuss and exchange their views, and to connect with their peers across Europe, an experience most of them will be making for the first time: Europe stops being a theory and becomes an experience! And it is the young audience that will act as a jury and vote for the winner right after the screenings. In a truly European vote, jury speakers will then transmit the national results via video to Erfurt (Germany) where the winner will be announced in an award ceremony streamed live on yaa.europeanfilmawards.eu, a special website that offers further information about the nominated films and the participating cities.

Right after the event, and supported by the Creative Europe – Media Sub-Programme of the European Union, the YAA films are also released on various online platforms for the general public: EFA Productions, EFA’s in-house production company, brings these films out Europe-wide and subtitled in 30 European languages on Video-on-Demand (T-VoD) platforms, like Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, Microsoft and Pantaflix, on the regional Balkan-platform Cinesquare, as well as on local platforms like Filmin!

Already online are the films from the last four editions; the three films nominated in 2019 will all go online on 6 May, one day after this year's EFA Young Audience Award. Films nominated in earlier editions will then follow.

EFA Productions teamed up with Under The Milky Way for this initiative to make the nominated films available for young viewers all year around. All those who could not participate in the EFA Young Audience Award event – or who are simply looking for quality films - have the possibility to watch the nominated films online. VoD is a great way to reach this age group to promote the EFA Young Audience Award and the films nominated for it.

The EFA Young Audience Award is organised and presented by the European Film Academy and EFA Productions with the support of Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung (MDM) and the Creative Europe – Media Sub-Programme of the European Union. The national YAA events are organised with the support of the respective national partners (find a full list here). Media partner is FRED FM Film Radio.